Leica R8 and flash

A day ago I posted a post about my Leica R8 and a Metz 36 C-2 flash. Well, looking thru a camera bag in my closet I found another flash new in box. It is a Metz 44AF-2 digital. Will this flash work on my R8 and give me full capabilities? I know crap about flash photography. Now I want to start to take flash photos. Thanks again for any info. Gus

Do the contacts on the flash match the pattern on the camera's hot shoe? IIRC, not exactly.

 

I seem to recall that these Metz flashes will not operate in the R8's auto TTL setting, but will work fine manually. Set the shutter dial on the lightning bolt and use the guide numbers on the back of the flash unit to determine the appropriate f-stop.

 

If all else fails, buy a Leica branded unit for full auto TTL flash. They're reasonably priced used.

 

Also try Google. ...

It looks like this flash is made in several versions (no SCA adapters with this one, you just have to buy the right version for your camera to start with). One of them is described as 'Mecablitz 44 AF-2 digital Olympus/Panasonic/Leica', but as far as I can this model only supports a narrow range of digital Leicas (rebadged Panasonics?), so I suspect you're out of luck, at least for anything other than manual. I don't think this flash even has a basic 'auto' (flash sensor) mode like your other Metz - they assume that anyone buying a 44 AF-2 this will have a compatible camera with its own TTL flash metering. I don't know if there's any risk of anything bad happening in manual mode. It's not always a great idea to put an incompatible dedicated flash on a different camera system (at least if if any of the dedicated contacts happen to line up). This won't be a problem with the Metz 36 C-2, which only has an X-sync terminal.